PC Game Pass, now includes EA Play! [PCGP, XGP:PC]

[BRiT]

Source is the Duel Screens Podcast -

Joining us this week is Stephen Danton and Sara Kitamura, the husband & wife dev team over at 2 Ton Studios, currently working on Unto the End - 2D cinematic combat-adventure game about loss and vengeance…maybe. The dynamic duo tell us what it's like jumping on-board Microsoft Game Pass, and - of course - they spill TONS (two tons worth, actually) on their atmospheric and highly anticipated game, Unto the End.

This is their story...​

 

[Cyan]

I started downloading Dirt Rally and I didnt realise the game weighs 100GB... It is going to take a while... It has hdr at least.

 

[Davros]

Looks like mechanical hard drives are going to be around for a while longer

 

[Malo]

Looks like mechanical hard drives are going to be around for a while longer

You're living in the past again. 1Tb SSDs are very cheap.

 

[Davros]

And how much are 8tb ssd's ?
I'm future proofing, we are now in the era of the 100+ gb game, I predict we will see 200+ gb games before the year is out.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare requires 175gb so get a 1tb ssd and enjoy playing your library of half a dozen games

 

[Malo]

And how much are 8tb ssd's ?
I'm future proofing, we are now in the era of the 100+ gb game, I predict we will see 200+ gb games before the year is out.
Call of Duty: Modern Warfare requires 175gb so get a 1tb ssd and enjoy playing your library of half a dozen games

And you're stuck in your mindset of installing hundreds of games. Gamers don't keep stuff installed anymore, especially when a vast majority are simply downloading it when needed and uninstalling when not via a store client. I'm usually at 3-5 games installed at any time.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

And you're stuck in your mindset of installing hundreds of games. Gamers don't keep stuff installed anymore, especially when a vast majority are simply downloading it when needed and uninstalling when not via a store client. I'm usually at 3-5 games installed at any time.

I'm not sure that generalization holds true. A lot of people play multiple persistent games, while not all of them feature large installs (Warframe is ~38 GB and POE is ~31 GB)), some are fairly heft (Destiny 2 is ~87 GB and GTA 5 is over 90 GB), and some are pretty massive (the aforementioned COD at 175 GB and RDR 2 is over 150 GB).

This doesn't even include racing games (Forza Horizon 4 without DLC is already 63 GB) or sports games (Fifa 20 is almost 50 GB without DLC) which I don't play.

This also doesn't include PC mods for games that can greatly inflate install size.

While a lot of people certainly uninstall games fairly rapidly, there are also a lot of people that keep multiple games installed because they play them either frequently or occasionally.

While I can certainly afford to have a 2TB drive in my machine for persistent games, not everyone is willing to spend that much just for games. And even here I often have to uninstall games before I have a chance to finish them (Metro: Exodus and Gears 5 [w/HD texture pack] for example) because I run out of space for new games I'd like to try out.

It can be a bit frustrating. Heck, one of the reasons I had to stop playing FFXIV and GW2 is that I had to choose games to stop playing to free up space on a 2 TB SSD or buy another SSD for games.

Regards,
SB

 

[Malo]

With modern download speeds and cloud saves, it's literally 20 minutes for many people to go back to a game they uninstalled 6 months ago and continue where they left off. Cheap and fast large SSD storage and fast internet connections for most makes this issue irrelevant.

 

[Silent_Buddha]

With modern download speeds and cloud saves, it's literally 20 minutes for many people to go back to a game they uninstalled 6 months ago and continue where they left off. Cheap and fast large SSD storage and fast internet connections for most makes this issue irrelevant.

Depends, it takes me about an hour to download 15 GBs which is a fraction of the size of most AAA games. And that doesn't take into account any potential bandwidth caps. Hence why I'm not using my 75 Mbps cable connection to download it instead of my 10-35 Mbps connection.

Do I want to be constantly re-installing multiple 100's of GBs of the same thing every month? Especially as SSD endurance degrades further with QLC likely replacing TLC in most drives similar to TLC replacing MLC and further back MLC replacing SLC?

Wear leveling can only do so much unless you massively increase how much of the drive is reserved for wear leveling and cells wearing out.

Regards,
SB

 

[Cyan]

With modern download speeds and cloud saves, it's literally 20 minutes for many people to go back to a game they uninstalled 6 months ago and continue where they left off. Cheap and fast large SSD storage and fast internet connections for most makes this issue irrelevant.

well, depends on where you live. I have like 3TB for games in a NVMe, the internal hard drive and two external drives.

Still, my download speed is outrageous for the place where I live, which is a mountainous place, with harsh climate -so rainy..., a few years ago it rained like the half of amount of rain you get annually in the Himalayas, 9500mm of rain there- and kind of isolated. A 20MB internet "radio" connection. Which is amazing, compared to my 3MB DSL connection of the past.

Yet, when it comes to downloading big games, sometimes I have no patience to wait for them to download.

 

[orangpelupa]

Ugh game pass eats all my sshd storage....

Gonna buy 4TB but Seagate only makes 2TB max for SSHD.

There's a cheap (40 dollars) used 2TB 7200 rpm sshd being sold... Maybe I'll buy that... But it's 3.5 inch... Hmm I think I can double tape it to the case... Hmm

 

[orangpelupa]

I'm not sure that generalization holds true. A lot of people play multiple persistent games, while not all of them feature large installs (Warframe is ~38 GB and POE is ~31 GB)), some are fairly heft (Destiny 2 is ~87 GB and GTA 5 is over 90 GB), and some are pretty massive (the aforementioned COD at 175 GB and RDR 2 is over 150 GB).

This doesn't even include racing games (Forza Horizon 4 without DLC is already 63 GB) or sports games (Fifa 20 is almost 50 GB without DLC) which I don't play.

This also doesn't include PC mods for games that can greatly inflate install size.

While a lot of people certainly uninstall games fairly rapidly, there are also a lot of people that keep multiple games installed because they play them either frequently or occasionally.

While I can certainly afford to have a 2TB drive in my machine for persistent games, not everyone is willing to spend that much just for games. And even here I often have to uninstall games before I have a chance to finish them (Metro: Exodus and Gears 5 [w/HD texture pack] for example) because I run out of space for new games I'd like to try out.

It can be a bit frustrating. Heck, one of the reasons I had to stop playing FFXIV and GW2 is that I had to choose games to stop playing to free up space on a 2 TB SSD or buy another SSD for games.

Regards,
SB

There's also the allure / enjoyment of "instant game" by keeping tons of games installed. No need to re-download. Just keep piling them up and you can play even old games in an instant.

Waiting 30 minutes download is troublesome, annoying, unfeasible, etc depending on mood, time available, internet condition, etc.

There's also the "good feeling" for knowing that I can play those games instantly. For knowing that even when the internet is down, I have tons of option to play.

Btw my max download speed is 7.5MB/s so downloading big games is a pain. Those with 100MB/s download speed... Still a rarity. (MB as in mega Bytes, not mega bits)

 

[Cyan]

Blair Witch is one of the weirdest games I've ever seen. The HDR makes the game look TOTALLY different compared with SDR. It's the same game but it looks like a whole different game.

Also, when I set the resolution to 1080p, the framerate is like 70-80fps, but when I set the resolution to the native monitor resolution, 1440p, the framerate is like 140fps on average. ‍‍

 

[Pete]

Operencia and Vampyr leaving Game Pass PC at the end of the month, so hustle.

The Steam Controller’s right stick trackpad would be perfect for Operencia—faster than right-stick look with an Xbox controller and comfier than KBM—but it looks like it would take some fiddling (either via Glosc or by changing the default button mappings).

 

[orangpelupa]

turns out gamepass pc ultimate can be shared to other PC, played on other user. I shared mine with a friend, and it does work.

according to reddit post, 1 sub actually can be played on 3 machines

2 xbox ones, 1 pc
2 PCs, 1 xbox one.

 

[Cyan]

PC gets Alien Isolation, by surprise. There shouldn't be a difference with the steam version but it's nice to have it. I enjoyed that game, save for the fear.... too much for me sometimes. Darn AI and alien.

 

[cheapchips]

PC gets Alien Isolation, by surprise. There shouldn't be a difference with the steam version but it's nice to have it. I enjoyed that game, save for the fear.... too much for me sometimes. Darn AI and alien.

There's TAA mod knocking about. Don't know if it'll work with the Gamepass version, but it's a very nice improvement to the visuals.

 

[Malo]

There's TAA mod knocking about. Don't know if it'll work with the Gamepass version, but it's a very nice improvement to the visuals.

Accessing the game files is frustrating but can be done. Modifying the game's executable is impossible though. The mod for TAA should be possible I think.

 

[Cyan]

after playing lots of hours of Resident Evil games -specially RE2 Remake and RE7- it's time to return to Gamepass! I've been missing it.

That being said, I'd wholeheartedly recommend giving State of Decay 2 a try. Crossplay coop fun, HDR10, a survival....

 

[Cyan]

these games are leaving gamepass PC on April 30th